Monday, March 23, 2015

Of Scars and Stories

People with scars are the most beautiful things in the
world. Without them, we are like an eye that has never shed a tear, or a tongue
that has never bathed in laughter. A night sky, without a single star.

Scars represent struggles. They reveal something deep and
real and beautiful, even though we cringe, and feel our stomachs turn at the
sight of them. Struggles are stories. And stories are life.

Not all scars are visible. Some of them linger, just under
the surface, or some deep down, where light has never touched. But all people
have scars.

They are proof of life past and life to come. Road-markers.
Reminders. Like day-dreams and dog-eared pages. Scars are our way of saying
“I’ve made it this far. (And maybe I can make it a little farther, yet.)”

The truth is that we are all jars of clay. Earthen bones,
vessels pulled from the ground, more breakable than glass and cheap as dirt. We
are easily broken, body and soul. And like clay jars, whenever we are cracked
or chipped or outright shattered, what hides inside us is revealed.

And like the things of dust that we are, we weren’t made for
shelf life, either—we expire much too quickly for that. We weren’t made for
mint condition—we gave that up the moment we took our first breath.

We were made for trenches. We were made to be broken open,
and prove what is inside us. Made to rocket through the world like a penny,
collecting grime and fingerprints from a thousand places, and to be rattled
clean at the end. We ricochet like bullets, in our little, orbiting lives,
racing from one moment to the next with hardly time for pause.

Scars are stories. Stories are scars.

Stories written in skin and soul and etched in the sinews of
the heart. We are scars on the skin of this hurtling sphere, living scars,
histories and memories and salt.

So roll up your sleeves, or pull off your shirt. Tear off
your mask, and show me all of the grime and the claw-marks on your face, from
when you were close enough to feel the devil's breath. Get rid of anything that
hides you. Show me your scars and I will show you mine. Show me the signs that
tell where you’ve been, and a glimpse of your tattered heart, so I can see
where you’re going. Pin them to your chest like medals, badges of weakness, signs
not of what storms you survived, but of what your faithful captain has brought
you through.

Show me your scars, and tell me your stories. I’ll show you
mine, like He showed me His. Mine gruesome and gaping and rotten, the holes
left behind by chains, peeled, tugged and pried from my flesh.

His only three—made by nails, and a spear. And yet, His
scars and mine share the same story.

The Story of a God who spoke a universe, who forged every
moment and watched every one of them poisoned. A God who suffered every ounce
of pain he witnessed, who watched his bride kidnapped and ravaged and who did
not remain idle. A God who entered this world through a woman to relieve the
curse of all mankind. A universal God, who folded himself into a child, and
grew to break the curse.

He died to prove His infinite love—and he rose again to
prove His infinite power.

God was poured out, into a clay jar of its own. A shallow,
breakable body, cracking in the cold and baking in the sun. He who spoke the
earth into being and drew life from its emptiness, humbled to fill that which
he drew from the ground, spinning on this temporal potter’s-wheel. When that
jar was splintered, the light spilled out; all the light of heaven, the light
of truth and goodness. It lit up the universe, with a story. A struggle,
between light and dark, that was over.

And that glow was poured out, into all of those fragile
vessels called to His service, to burn inside them. Vessels of clay, full
of heaven’s treasure. With every crack, we release the light that we contain,
until we shine like lamps in the darkness. With every scar, with every hurt,
every hardship, we prove not the light of what is in us. But who is
in us.

Every time we are broken, body and soul, we become not
something more whole—but something more wholly His. Something a
little more like the treasure entrusted to us.

We are vessels of clay, sculpted to tell stories. Made to be
scarred. Made to point to something all our lives, and to keep on pointing, at
their end. For through our scars, our struggles, our stories, we reveal
something more about the healer, the overcomer, and the storyteller.

And the truth is that my story and His have the same
character. And it sure isn’t me.

Sunday, March 15, 2015

In the Kingdom of light, the King stood
upon the wall, with his shining son beside him. “The Time is come,” declared
the father. “Though she remembers us not, she has suffered enough. My son, the
task is yours, for she is yours.”

Without sword, and without armor, the
Prince went down, into the dark city, and all the savage people spilled around
him. The kings of the city, with their sons and the men of the earth,
surrounded him, as he stood at the door of Zion’s den. And she could not hide
from his voice, as he called her.

“Zion!” He called. “It is time to come
home.”

But in her terror and her guilt, she
cowered and did not go down to meet him. Again he called, until, the third
time, he pushed open the door, and went into her. He found her there, beside
the bed, almost unrecognizable in her filth, too afraid to look at him. She
tried to hide, but he found her, and looked at her with such a pity in his eyes
that his gaze seemed to burn her.

Though she pulled away from him, he knelt
in front of her, and grasped her hand, though she tried to pull it back. He saw
that she wore no ring, and she knew, with the weight of shame crashing like
waves inside her, that she could not go back. And now, he knew it as well.

And yet, his eyes were without anger. She
wished that he would be angry, but he was not. Instead, he held her hand
tightly, as he took the ring from his own finger, and slid it onto hers,
ignoring her objections.

“Though you turned your back on the
King,” he said, “Though you’ve turned away from me, I have come again. I will
take your place, here. And you shall take mine. None may enter the kingdom, except
those who share the King’s blood; so long as this sign is yours, that blood
beats in your veins as well, as his adopted. No more will you play the whore;
no more shall you be faithless. No more shall you suffer.”

She protested, but to no avail, and
though she tried, the ring would not come off her hand. The messengers of the
King entered the room and they took her in their arms, bearing her swiftly
away. None of the people of the city stood to stop them, as the Prince entered
the street again, without arm, without even decoration.

“You have rights to her no more,” cried
the Prince. “For she is of the Bloodline of the King. But see that now, I stand
in her place, faithful to the faithless. I, who was once the heir of your
enemy—I am yours. A child of the earth. Do to me as you please.”

So the men of the city seized him, seeing
that he was unarmed, and they beat him and branded him and slathered him in
filth. But no matter how they sought to mar him, the glow of his face shone
through, and the light of him hurt their eyes. They dragged him to the open
palace, the sepulcher of the world, and there they tore him, in the sight of all.

Zion, though she was already outside of
the city, turned, and she could see, even from a distance, the cruelties, the
monstrosities done to him, even as she was borne to safety. With every scream
of pain or pleasure that reached her, she found her weeping only harder, her
pain only more severe.

But then, the pained groans ceased, and
there were only the cheers. In the palace of the earth, his body fell, broken
and lifeless, in a pool of his own bright blood, mingling with the filth of the
street, staining the gathered feet and fists that beat him.

The prince’s body was taken up, and the
crowds paraded him throughout the city. Their enemy was dead. The one they
feared was no more. His body, cold, empty of life, they threw into the alleys,
with the other deathly things, and the children pelted it with stones.

Night came upon them. But Zion had
already reached the hedge, and when they neared, the thorns and vines peeled
away, at the signet that she wore. The servants of the King carried her up,
into the palace, and the King met her there, cradling her in his great arms,
with his own sweet tears spilling onto her head, as hers fell onto his
hands.

When night came, the people of the city left
the body there. From the top of the walls, the King watched, with little Zion
asleep, in his arms, as the people chanted and sang, celebrating the death of
their enemy, spilling their wine and their filth to mingle with the Prince’s
blood, on the palace steps. They sang themselves to sleep, and in the streets
they slept, heaped up like the beasts of a kennel.

But in the street, the Prince opened his
eyes. He rose, from the street, from the death and the misery that surrounded
him, and he left the city alone. Though his blood soaked his clothes, his
wounds were healed. The great hedge opened, at the touch of his hand, and the
gates parted, to admit his entrance.

Around him, the creatures of the kingdom
poured, with cheers and praise, and with wonder in their eyes at this miracle.
The King, and Zion beside him, came down to meet him there. And Zion, weeping,
collapsed around his knees.

“How?” She cried. “How do you stand
before me, even now, though they killed you?”

“Death is the inheritance of all of those
who have turned their back on their King,” replied the Prince, as he lifted
her. “It is the judgment of all of those, who have chosen the lower world, and
who seek its pleasures. But for those in whose veins the blood of the Kingdom
flows, the cage of death has no might, and the wrath of the dark world has no
sting.”

He took his betrothed in his arms again,
and took her up to her chamber in the palace of the king, where he laid her,
wrapped in the garments of her safety. But still, she held him, when he set her
down, staring into his eyes, and seeming to fall into their depth. “Why?” She
wept. “Why did you do this? Why have you suffered so much, for me?”

“To prove my love to you,” he said, “I
have endured all things. Now, I have won you. I have purchased you, with my own
blood. No more shall you fly to the darkness; for no more shall it have any
hold in you. No more are you the offspring of its womb. Now, you are the
offspring of my love.”

And as she slept, safe and soundly in her
bed, the Prince turned aside to his father, with a deep and fuming wrath within
his heart. “My father,” he called, “too long this beast has reigned. I would
suffer its darkness no longer. I would take my bride; I have bought her, and
bound her in love. But first, I would finish what has been begun. I would
avenge the honor robbed her.”

The King nodded to him. “Go; do what
shall be done.”

With eyes like blazing fire, the Prince took
on his armor, and lifted his great sword, and strung his bow, turning against
the dark kingdom, below. Though the gates were closed to him, his war-hammer
split them down the middle, and the shaking, rumbling walls gave out. Light,
blinding and complete, spilled into the street at his back.

And all of Zion’s abusers, the kings and
the princes of the city, the lords and the deceivers, gathered and squealed in
fear, crying, “You were dead! We killed you!”

“The cage of death has no rights to claim
me, and neither have they any rights to claim she, that you ravaged, whom I
have died for. But for you, this day, sons of darkness, there is only
death.”

With his great blade, he struck them down
in heaps, though they came against him, and he broke their swords like straw,
and their shields like dry leaves. His rage was like a lion’s, as he tore
through their streets. His arrows were like lightning bolts, shattering their
high towers and bring down the crumbling stones, as he hunted down the lords
and their wicked sons, piling them in the temple where they served their kings
of death.

In the palace of the earth, with his bare
hands upon the pillars, he pulled the foundations up, and buried the bodies in
a tomb of their own worship. With the fire of his wrath, he burned the ruins,
and the chains, which tethered the worlds together, he tore away, and the place
of shadow slid away, into destruction, and was no more.

To the Kingdom of Light, the Prince
returned. And there, where the light shone, glorious and magnificent, he came to
his chosen bride. Gone was the darkness inside her; gone was the hunger for
that place that was no more, as she saw the great scars he wore, each one laid
upon him in her place. She was at peace, content in the presence of her rescuer,
as he spoke softly beside her.

“So long as you bear that signet, you are
the daughter of the King, by every right,” he told her, the words familiar.
“Not only an image of him; but a bearer of his blood and name. Such am I. But
His blood is within my veins, already. For I am the image that you wear; I am
the image of Him, the firstborn of his blood. But now, you shall share my
blood. You shall share the lineage of the King, himself.”

And he raised her, stronger than ever she
had been, fairer than ever she had been. In his presence, her light returned;
and in his shadow, her love for him grew more and more, until all that she once
longed for seemed like the longings of a wandering child. No more did she and
the king walk in the gardens, as before; for now, the gardens were being
cleared, and a place for a wedding prepared.

As evening came, so stood Zion, crowned
in beauty, beside the Prince. Once, a very different creature; once nothing at
all. She that had been nothing had been made everything—for the King of
everything gave up the treasure worth it all, to make her His.

Her wedding gown was made from the scars
she yet wore, and his was the scars he bore for her. But even then, as the
light of the feast fell upon her, it seemed that the lines on her body started
to fade; healing with his every touch.

She, the Betrothed of Heaven, estranged
from the world that once rotted inside her. And though it lingered, in her
memory, in that moment, and in all the moments that followed, it seemed to
serve no purpose but to strengthen her love for the light, in which she had
been brought to stand.

For stand she did; but only with her hand
in his. She was strong in a victory that she could not claim, though it is her
battle that had been ended. It was His victory, the glory of the love that had
found her in the darkness, the love that brought her home, to make whore a
queen. The love that chose a loveless child of ruin; faithful to the faithless.

And in the Kingdom of Light, glorious and
magnificent, there reigned the King, with a perfect heart, and at his right
hand the Prince. And beside the Prince, his bride; and though she seems a
slight ornament, in such a place, she is the completion of its grandeur. For in
her, the love of the Prince shone out, the brightest of any light that hung in
the sky.

And all who dwelt in that
place were never dry of joy.

An Author’s Note:

If you’ve made it this far in the story,
I have to admit that I am not only tickled and impressed, but grateful. I hope
that it has, at least to some extent, stirred your heart to a degree

The story of Zion has a lot of parallels,
and I’m not going to try to point them all out here. To explain them would be to
take away the power of imagery, and I’d rather not negate the whole point of the Betrothed if I can help it.

But one thing I will address—who is Zion?
There are lots of answers, to that one. She is a character with dozens of
parallels. Most of her character, and the inspiration for the story in general,
came from the book of Hosea, which has rapidly become one of the most powerful
books of the Bible to me. But on a larger scale, the story of Zion is the
story of the whole Old Testament, the unfaithfulness of God’s chosen,
undeserving people, and his constant, faithful tenderness in bringing them back
to him, and eventually, his purchase of her through the death of his son. It is
the story of the chosen people of Israel becoming the chosen people of the
world.

But it is also something much more
personal. Because after all of the parallels, and under all of the imagery,
Zion is me. Zion is my own unfaithfulness, her heart is my heart, her hunger
for a dying world is my own. Her struggles, her aches and pains, I know them
all.

And yet, thanks to the grace of God, I
know the mercy of the rescuer that I attempted to capture in the character of
the prince. I understand—feebly and imperfectly—the love that he has for her,
and the love that my own rescuer bears for me. I know Grace, as it has been
poured over me, as I have drowned in it, and felt my stains removed by his bleaching blood.

Zion is me, and humanity in general. And
just like her, I am saved, rescued to live a life greater than any I could have imagined.

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About Me

My name is Jeff. I am a writer of words, and a servant of King Jesus. Lover of good books, great coffee, dear friends and sunshine, living in a world forged by words, in a land spun from golden summers and grey winters. I see things differently, and I write what I see.